THE FANTASTIC WORLDS OF FRANK FRAZETTA

This monograph is the biggest and most complete ever produced on the artist, done in collaboration with the Frazetta family and with top collectors. Frank Frazetta has reigned as the undisputed lord of fantasy art for 50 years, his fame only growing in the 10 years since his death. With his paintings now breaking auction records, he's long overdue for this ultimate monograph. This has a LOT of material rarely or never before seen. Many nudes that Frank just did for himself are here; early work from his youth and early days in comics, Li'l Abner and Thunda pages, early comic book covers -- all from his original art. There are also later advertising works never before collected, early paperback covers now show from the paintings. There's also a good bibliography of many of the works originally published as paperback, magazine and book covers. Frank claimed to make art only when there was nothing better to do -- he preferred playing baseball -- yet began his professional career in comics at age 16. Strip work led him to the infamous EC Comics, ghosting Li'l Abner, then finally to oils for Tarzan and Conan pulp covers which put him on the fantasy map. He used his first-hand knowledge of muscle, macho, and gorgeous women gained from living on the streets of Brooklyn, to redefine fantasy heroes as more massive, more menacing, more testosterone-fueled than anything seen before. As counterbalance he created a new breed of women, as nude as censorship allowed, with pixie faces and idealized bodies. There are a LOT of nudes here, including paintings that Frank redid after publication, sans clothing! His idealized woman is everywhere in evidence. Add in the action, the creatures, the twilit worlds of haunting shadow and Frazetta's art is addictive. I was asked to edit the captions dealing with Frazetta's comic work so I made it into the Acknowledgements, and got a close up advance look at this. It's incredible. Even while a lot of fine books have been devoted to Frank's work, this is one no collector is going to want to miss -- much like the best-selling History of EC Comics was for EC collectors, which was also done in this huge XXL format. You'll be pleased with the quality of artwork, the never before seen material, the inside stories and more. - Bud Note: the carrying box these come in is meant as a shipping container. So they get bumped and scraped en route to us. We pass them on as is. They are meant to be tossed after doing their duty and keeping each book pristine. However, because our shipment arrived by truck, our boxes have virtually no damage. And we are reboxing each inside a larger box with padding, to keep this protective illustrated box in the best condition (each is shrink-wrapped, as is the book inside). The total edition of this is 6,000 copies, each with a specially numbered bookplate mounted inside. Another un-numbered edition is already planned. This is part of Taschen's "Famous First Edition" series, like they did on the Marvel Spider-Man and other XXL editions. Our large initial order is all Famous First Edition/numbered copies and will be until further notice. This is now officially out of print; Amazon no longer lists it, and their resellers are asking $300. Our final reorder of first printings is now in stock at the original published price. We don't expect these to last much past June, 2023 at the rate they are now selling at. After these are gone, we will be offering the un-numbered but otherwise identical edition. This new printing is due in early June. A deluxe slipcased version features an aluminum print cover, vegan leather-bound spine, foil embossing, and a velvet slipcase, limited to 1000.  Otherwise contents are identical. Availability subject to change; we have copies currently in stock. Rush Service and International shipping could require an additional charge.